You don’t create a culture. Culture happens. It’s the by-product of consistent behavior. If you encourage people to share, and you give them the freedom to share, then sharing will be built into your culture. If you reward trust, then trust will be built into your culture.

By working collaboratively to determine the organization’s core values and vision, every individual involved can work toward developing the culture they want at their workplace. In another article, I came across a very helpful example of how powerful a shift in culture can be. They use the case study of how Chrysler turned around through a dramatic cultural change, including some of the snags and backtracking along the way. One of their main points is one we come across quite often through consulting:

The proponents of change must carefully model the behavior they want to see in others. If they do not send a consistent message and keep that message clear and dominant over time, cultural change may be seen as just another fad.

Culture change requires vigilance and continuous attention, as well as active stakeholder input (this includes staff!). You’d be shocked at how much input you can get just by asking for it! Without consistency, though, old habits will return, and the lack of urgency can lead to an organization who views every new idea as if it’s just another fad that will fizzle if ignored long enough.

On the other hand, “putting it in writing” really demands accountability. That’s why this blog entry from ebizq.net caught my eye. They throw out a somewhat unsubstantiated, but still jarring, statistic:

70% of organizations with a formal process for strategy execution were exceeding the performance of their peers in their industry, while in contrast only 27% of those without a formal process were.

Kind of makes you wanna write out some goals, measurements, and due dates, doesn’t it?

We would love to see you there.

But! Here’s a great strategy for strategy planning! This article illustrates that if you think about the various options being put forth during the planning process as happy stories about the future, it’s much easier to keep ideas flowing and develop them without getting stuck in logistics.

What a fun way to tackle the process. Here’s that article again:

http://blogs.hbr.org/martin/2010/06/strategies-as-happy-stories.html

The idea is if you allow the last 5 minutes of your day to assess what you wanted to get done and compare that to what you actually got done, you can figure out the WHY, and change your behavior accordingly. Apply this methodology to your business, and you’re on the right track!

Check out the HBR article here.

On March 2nd, Demarche president Dr. Linda Paralez will be speaking on Strategic Planning for any size business at our new Redmond office! Feel free to bring an associate, or pass the invitation on to others who could benefit from some good business direction. Details below!

What: Strategic Planning: Take the Stress Out of Strategy
When: Wednesday, March 2nd, 1:30 – 3pm
Where: Demarche:Eastside
thinkspace Boardroom
8201 164th Ave NE, Suite 200
Redmond, WA 98052
Cost: FREE

Key take aways from this workshop include:
· Why you should do strategic planning
· What’s included in a strategic plan
· Effective planning tools and how to use them
· How to identify ‘who gets to say’

You will also receive a free copy of Dr. Paralez’ white paper on best management practices for stakeholder inclusion in strategic planning!

For more information on this event or Demarche, shoot me an email! And stay tuned for ongoing updates, tips, and articles about Strategic Planning all month leading up to the event.

A big danger in businesses of any size or shape is the tendency toward ‘to do list‘ thinking. I do it. I’m a master of to do lists. I have organically growing to do lists all over my office: two post-it notes right by my keyboard, a color-coded list on the white board behind me, individual ‘to do’s on my Outlook calendar (an attempt at time management). This is a great method and it works for me. The only downside (apart from clutter) is that the big picture, the vision, the goals are all totally out of sight and out of mind.

Getting up there to the strategic thinking place has to be deliberate. Put it on your to do list. One thing Linda likes to say is ‘whatever you do, do it on purpose.’ That’s a great reason to think strategically. And it’s a great way to go about strategic planning. Be deliberate. Think big (mission, vision, goals) and work down to the ‘to do list’ of making it happen (objectives, action plans).

Throughout the month of February, Demarche will be bringing you the tools you need to implement some effective strategic planning, develop a solid strategic plan, implement your ideas, and measure your progress. Armed with the appropriate gear, you will get to jump into 2011 with the confidence of taking your organization toward established goals on purpose.

Unless that goal is to fax a cat.

When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.

- Confucious

Demarche:Eastside
8201 164th Avenue, Suite 200
Redmond, WA 98052

More to come!

For example, the dashboards most of us are commonly acquainted with are those in our automobiles. On most contemporary vehicles, there are a relatively few ‘system’ indicators, compared to the more common set of ‘process’ indicators we use and rely on routinely. All the indicators are graphic. All are simple and designed according to the actions the operator needs to take in response to the information provided.  All information about the system—in this case, the vehicle – is contextual, it tells about how that vehicle is working under the conditions it is operating under.

For example:

This simple example provides insight to how dashboards might be designed to be useful to a department manager. The director of the department needs and benefits from dashboards provided by each division of the operation.  What they often get, however, rarely resembles the elegance and simplicity, plus the power of decision-making provided in our typical automobile.

If we were to envision what these ‘ideal’ dashboards would be, what would they look like, and, better yet, what would the effort ‘behind the scenes’ need to be to provide the data to populate such simplicity?

Part of the answer – in truth, a large part – begins with the clear, shared definition of purpose – of the overall system, parts of the system, process elements, etc. This point is important to understand because we cannot measure what we’ve not defined. In this example, we have division functions contributing to many process outcomes: efficient on its face, but inefficient in that individual divisions fail to report on overall process performance (e.g., how’s the temperature, fuel gage, mileage).

If we are clear that the purpose of the process is to monitor and manage how well our design is delivering (percent of bills paid on time, quality and timeliness of customer response, etc.), then those are the things on our dashboard. If, however, we get caught up in the functional trap of thinking about what we assume is the ‘purpose’ of our division or unit, we begin to report data that is difficult to align with an understanding or whether the system is performing well – e.g., is the ‘check engine’ light on or not?

Some of the data we are tempted to report is minutia or out of context, such as a process measure without a systems measure, without context or meaning.  There is no real understanding of why it matters to the customer. The first question is “what’s the target?” The second question is “does the target matter to the system?” The third is that if you improved time or alternatively didn’t do the task, what would happen?

With those questions, it is legitimate for upper management to conclude that these data, while potentially relevant to the task manager, mean little or nothing to the Director. It has no context, no target, no impact on customer or stakeholders, no monitoring relevance, and no reason it serves as a monitoring or management tool.

So what would work?

Criteria for dashboard indicators at the director level always assume that the next lower level of management are also thinking intelligently about the data reported to them, and synthesizing that data into good, contextual information. Often, this doesn’t happen.

Managers of functional divisions have a particular challenge in the traditional model of ‘dysfunctional’ government in that they are asked to manage functionally but measure and report based on process performance. Of course, the ‘best practice solution’ is to functionally organize according to process, but, unfortunately, few public sector organizations have been able to move to these more productive and customer-centric models[2].

When reporting the performance of a process, all players in the process are part owners in the outputs/deliverables. The structures of functional organizations cause managers to report that their function provided services, at a determined service level, to the process. In other words, the manager is not responsible to assure the process, or the system works, only that they provide some number of gallons of gas at some frequency, regardless of need.

This model doesn’t serve the organizational purpose, which is often written at a more ‘global’ level – something more targeted toward customer service, satisfaction, success, revenue recovery, etc.

Recommendations always focus on removing the built-in structural barriers that prevent good managers from even conceiving the idea of good dashboards. Start with clear purpose. This leads to structural change – or, at minimum, structural partnerships.

Finally, get a good consultant/facilitator who can help your subject matter experts design appropriate systems and process indicators. The following are the basic steps a team of subject matter experts would be led through to create a department level set of dashboards.

Charter the team, and build a work plan around the following four task elements:

Step 1 – draw the systems map (illustrating how each process contributes to the system and how they’re interrelated) and align the purpose of the system and parts of the system to the map. Iterate until there is agreement that the system and parts of the system are illustrated.

Step 2 – name the process parts of the system (e.g., B1, B2, etc.) where a process flow chart and process control with performance standards, capacity, capability and purpose are needed.  Establish performance expectations, targets, tie-ins to the overall system, and means to collect appropriate data.  Use outputs family of measures as a guideline for selection of these process measures (see text box).

Step 3 – define the outcomes of the system using outcomes family of measures as a guideline (see text box).

Step 4 – select the most important measures for monitoring and reporting (impact to customer, critical to quality, critical to cost, etc.) then align the dashboards on the system map and develop reporting frequency.

Can our state, county and municipal budgets be reduced in a rational way that preserves current service levels, provides on-going savings in future years, and does not require any group to bear a disproportionate share of the reductions?  My experience tells me the answer is “yes”- and the savings may be considerable, immediate, and relatively simple to identify.  Not, however, so simple to implement.

In many ways, the current recession and the resulting budgetary impacts on state and local government are outside the experience of many current leaders and managers.  For this generation of public sector management, the fiscal environment has been relatively stable, and temporary solutions proved adequate to bridge any budgetary fluctuations that occurred in their experience.  So, predictably, our current, more significant revenue shortfalls have resulted in a range of reactions and short-term stop-gap measures that proved sufficient in the past.  Measures like across-the-board budget cuts, layoffs, furloughs, and reductions in salaries and benefits.

But I suggest these tactics are not practical solutions particularly because they are short-term.  Doing what you’ve always done is very ingrained in public sector management, regardless of the practicality of the act, or the likelihood of success.  After all, the success or failure of these kinds of decisions is not criteria for measuring the performance of public sector management.  They get paid either way – agonizing as the work might be.

Another Option

Any approach to budget reduction must acknowledge that budget cuts without a business rationale are temporary.  When one-time or across the board cuts are imposed, organizations often cut muscle and bone while leaving fat untouched, resulting in inefficiencies that are perpetuated, and in some cases, exaggerated, through future budget years.

There is another approach which continually escapes our leaders. A long-term approach anticipates that an analysis of service delivery requirements, priorities, and processes will yield recurring savings without jeopardizing service levels.  It requires the rejection of simplistic, expedient, and one-time reductions, and demands an investment in thoughtfully analyzing, then optimizing, core functions, services and processes. This long-term investment requires a willingness and ability to set and adhere to priorities.  The work begins, always, with scrutiny of an organization’s basic purpose, desired outcomes, and the assumptions that frame existing processes.  When that is accomplished, it becomes possible to change how, when, and which services are delivered.

Compliance versus Commitment

So why don’t more leaders and organizations seek long-term fiscal, operating, service and quality-of-work-life solutions?  My best answer is that they lack the competency (knowledge, skills, and aptitude), confidence, and commitment to take a long-term approach.  These shortcomings are not specifically individual or personal, but rather organizational, cultural, and systemic.  The culture of public service rewards immediate responses, even if they are not effective or bring unanticipated outcomes.  On the other hand, this culture tends to punish (at worst), or simply not support (at best), the teamwork, collaboration, and testing required to successfully re-engineer processes.  Leaders often lack the confidence to proceed without support, and yield to expediency instead.

The system of rewards and incentives for the management of public entities balances more on the side of encouraging (intended or not) passivity, maintenance of the status quo and risk avoidance.  Positive, tangible rewards for innovation, efficiency or effectiveness, are rarely found.  For example, public managers, leaders, and staff are paid the same regardless of the quality of their performance.

Influence of Hierarchy

The organization of public entities leans toward the traditional hierarchal structure, which works best with  specialized, insular silos, in which decisions, communication, and processes are closely held within a work unit.  And, while decisions and processes controlled inside a work unit often result in localized efficiencies within that unit, this type of organization nearly always results in the creation of bottlenecks and inefficiencies for the organization or system as a whole.  And government does have a difficult time seeing itself as a system – particularly a system that provides service.  Citizens and customers almost always have a better view of the system than the individuals working in that system.

An example might be the “obvious” relationship between and among the fire, police, building and land use, public works, transportation, and utility departments.  Citizens experience and see the relationship since they are forced to move through all these departments to negotiate building permits or nuisance complaints.  Inside those departments, however, they see their individual processes as separate and distinct from each other, framed by different rules, codes, logic and policies that may often conflict.

Long-term solutions require dismantling organizational silos and the artificial division of roles and responsibilities to even begin a serious analysis of functions, services, and processes.  Leaders must expend considerable time and energy to challenge these organizational barriers.  These barriers (silos) proliferate regularly and widely in a hierarchy to maintain the personal control and power of a supervisor, manager, or work unit.  The positive side of this dynamic is the recognition of the personal investment and self-interest tied to this type of structure.  The downside is that attempts to reform the organization are often met with fierce resistance.  Leaders find it more expedient not to “rock the boat” and tolerate the status quo.

A Summary

Populations have grown, challenges are more complex, the tools and technology are more sophisticated, and expectations are higher for state and local government now than a generation ago.  Few would argue that point; yet, today’s public management (generally speaking) has been hired from job descriptions dating back a generation or more, and many of them haven’t worked outside their current department or their current specialty.  Given public sector lack of investment in improvement and innovation there are few opportunities for public managers, even those who are professionally trained, to acquire the training and skills needed to envision and achieve long-term solutions to today’s problems.

From my perspective, however, there are “islands of excellence” that challenge the status quo.  These are public sector organizations, leaders, and managers that have successfully found long-term solutions, who continually rethink and re-engineer their processes, who find significant savings while increasing the quality and quantity of services, and who do overcome bureaucratic inertia.  The lessons and experiences of these “island of excellence” can be used to inform, teach, and groom others to achieve the same or greater successes.

Public sector decision makers can choose to continue down the current path of short-term tactics (across the board budget cuts, layoffs, furloughs, reductions in services) which will replay themselves year after year, or they can embrace a long-term and systematic approach.  They can continue to embrace expediency or they can invest in the training of their people and reform of cultures, organizations, and systems that impede long-term solutions.  They can seek out and leverage the knowledge and experience of those who have found success in long terms solutions… or not.  After all, it all pays the same – for them.